…Not all the time. This is another cliche that parents of special needs kids hear. And where it is true that I am a better person for having Maddie in my life, there are plenty of moments where it has made me a worse person.

Now you brats sit still while I read this damned book to you!

My wife Susan and I were together for 15 years before Madeline came into our life. I am being truthful when I say that we had around 3 major arguments in those 15 years. For the first 4 years of Maddie, we continued to be pretty blissful, as she was such a sweet girl and we were so happy after trying for so long to have a child. Then came the twins…

Now I cannot stress enough that having twins is not a good thing. A lot of people make the claim Oh, wouldn’t it be great to have twins, then we can get out of the way having our 2 children all at once! No parent of twins has ever listened to these words and nodded their heads with a smile on their face. Here’s how I describe my duo in my standup act.

Look, I love my twins, but I call them the Dallas Cowboys. Good individually, but they suck as a team.

Imagine having 1 baby, then double that. Double the shitting. Double the spitting. And definitely double the crying.

The crying was our worst part because Maddie, like a lot of people on the spectrum does not like loud noises. As I’ve outlined here before, it was a nightmare for the first couple of years. Then it got gradually better. Very gradual.  For those of you that are curious, the Terrible Two’s do exist, especially when you have 2 Terrible 2’s. What isn’t discussed is how 3 years old is pretty much just as bad. Now there are plenty of great moments during these years and they are cute as fuck (which is the only reason you don’t murder them), but even if I take Maddie’s special needs out of the equation, having 2 toddlers is a recipe for insanity.

Despite being a sometimes foul-mouthed comedian on-stage, I’m not a big cursor off-stage. I can recall only cursing a handful of times around my kids and they don’t seem to have picked up on it, since I have never heard them repeat a bad word I’ve uttered. This is an important parenting battle. In 2 parent homes a badge of honor is not being the person that your kids picked up a naughty word from. My wife and I are still battling it out. On one of the few occasions she does curse around the kids I get a perverse pleasure out of it. You see if they pick it up from her, I will have a major victory in my column. (Susan is a great Mom, so I need all the little victories I can get to come even close to balancing the ledger.)

Now don’t get me wrong, these 3 do have me cursing all the time–internally. I am muttering under my breath some of the most vile words all the time, when I’m by myself with these 3. It’s like a steady stream on the level of Ralphie’s Dad when he is trying to fix the furnace.

When people meet me at a party they are often surprised that I’m a standup comedian because I’m not the life of the party type guy. Actually most standup comics I know are far more like this and way less like Robin Williams. While I wouldn’t call myself as laid-back, I was never very demonstrative off-stage, until having the twins. Since then I have become a crazy person. I’m constantly screaming at my kids or just the world in general. I’m continually yelling at my crew, then grabbing them and hugging them. If I only had Pasta bolognese on the stove, I could technically classify myself as an Italian mother.

So when people say to me, I bet you can’t imagine your life without your kids, I respond with try me. Some days that’s all I can hang onto.

Having multiples and a developmentally delayed child has made me reconsider people I used to condemn. Perfect example is Kate Gosselin of Jon and Kate Plus 8. I used to think this chick was a total witch, but after having just twins, I can’t imagine how insane I would be if I had 8 kids. That woman deserves to be a complete bitch. 8 kids will make you Octomom crazy.

Now that I’m reaching the end of this essay, I want to make this perfectly clear (since someday my kids will read this), I LOVE YOU AND YOU ARE THE BEST THING TO EVER HAPPEN TO ME!  Sure I even yell at you when I write, but do not judge me, as I am doing the best I can. Well, most of the time I am. As you are well-aware of, sometimes Daddy is a dick and needs to chill the fuck-out. Oh and just so you know, I learned all these bad words from your Mom.